Modha Rathri: the Pushpa house bets on a first night

A fresh wedding, a house full of relatives, and a bedroom light that refuses to go off. Modha Rathri plays out over a single night, and its trailer is out with a date attached: August 21 in theatres. The name worth noticing sits in the producer’s slot. Mythri Movie Makers, the Telugu banner behind Pushpa, is putting its weight behind a small rural comedy from debut director Raja Karuppasamy, with Rishikanth stepping up from character roles to hero for the first time and Anishma Anilkumar, who earned her notices in Sirai and Youth, as the female lead. When Mythri unveiled the title in May, the pitch read wedding-night thriller; the trailer sells something warmer, a comedy of escalations inside one house.

Producer Ravi Shankar kept the pitch simple: the story sold itself the day Raja narrated it. He pointed to the run of small films winning big on the strength of writing, Tourist Family being the obvious recent case, and slotted this one into that lane. Good premise, tight budget, no stars to service.

Raja Karuppasamy’s own account of the film is the most personal thing said all day. The director came to Chennai from Thoothukudi, carried the story for years, and built it out of his own experience. “Small-budget films are what will take Tamil cinema to the next stage,” he said, before dedicating the film to all the women in his life.

For Rishikanth, the road here has been long and specific. Modha Rathri began life as a short film Raja brought to him, and the two have spent six years turning it into this. “My first thanks goes to the media that noticed and praised my characters across so many films,” he said, crediting a director who refused to let go of him and producers who trusted the story. His promise for the film itself: watch it as a family.

Anishma plays a character called Muthu Selvi, and kept her turn at the mic short, thanking the director for picking her and the unit that carried the film.

The guest list did some heavy lifting for the film’s confidence. Karthik Subbaraj called Rishikanth an actor who absorbs a character whole, and reached for a familiar reference: “Watching this film felt like watching a Bhagyaraj sir film.” That is the second time in a week the K. Bhagyaraj comparison has come out at a Chennai launch, after Senthil said the same of Elan. Ayalaan director R. Ravikumar went a step further on the lead: a director’s craft shows in what he chooses to film, and this film proves Rishikanth has moved up to the hero’s slot for good.

The cast around the leads brought their own stories. Venkatesh, who says the offers turned uniformly negative after Angadi Theru, plays against that grain here, and joked that he acted with one eye on his young co-star: “I stayed alert the whole time, worried Rishikanth would overtake me in a scene. He will become a big actor.” Chetan remembered the narration session where his whole family sat and laughed through the story, and revealed the role was first offered to his wife, whose dates would not cooperate.

Composer Bharath Sankar got the biggest laugh at the director’s expense: “Raja is an innocent, guileless man. The film has come out exactly the opposite, sharp and well made.” Directors Sriganesh, who has known Rishikanth for over a decade, Keerthiswaran, who called the casting half the battle won, and Paari all lined up behind the film, with Paari landing the line of the day: big films energise you, but small films are the ones that surprise you. Ashok Arjunan has cut the film, and Bharath Sankar’s songs carry Yugabharathi’s lyrics.

Modha Rathri reaches theatres worldwide on August 21.